Monte Cook’s City by the Spire If you were to imagine the most deluxe roleplaying game product ever, what would be in it? More than 600 pages of fantasy source and adventure material from one of the industry’s greatest designers? Check. Glorious full-color art? Check. Double-sided poster map? Player handouts? A CD-ROM packed with bonus material? Check, check, and check. A Deluxe Adventure-Sourcebook What is Ptolus? The ultimate fantasy campaign in which adventurers plumb the depths of a gigantic underground labyrinth filled with treasure, monsters, and traps—or try to make names for themselves in a city filled with intrigues, politics, and mystery. The very first and longest-running 3rd Edition campaign, run by one of the game’s designers for industry celebs including two editors of Dragon magazine, two editors of Dungeon, three Wizards of the Coast roleplaying designers and three editors, and even the D&D business manager. A detailed city setting crammed with characters, locations, and enough adventures to take characters from 1st to 20th level. The most deluxe RPG package ever designed; this 640-page book includes more than 130 pages of color artwork and maps, bound-in fabric bookmarks, two dozen handouts, and a CD-ROM containing additional bonus products—including more than 350 pages of additional Ptolus adventures and source material. A work of unsurpassed usability, featuring extensive indexing and cross-referencing throughout, designed and tested by the author of the Dungeon Master’s Guide and the “Dungeoncraft” column in Dungeon to make play even easier and more fun.
Author
The game designer Monte Cook started working professionally in the game industry in 1988. In the employ of Iron Crown Enterprises, he worked with the Rolemaster and Champions games as an editor, developer, and designer. In 1994, Monte came to TSR, Inc., as a game designer and wrote for the Planescape and core D&D lines. When that company was purchased by Wizards of the Coast, he moved to the Seattle area and eventually became a senior game designer. At Wizards, he wrote the 3rd Edition Dungeon Master's Guide and served as codesigner of the new edition of the Dungeons & Dragons game. In 2001, he left Wizards to start his own design studio, Malhavoc Press, with his wife Sue. Although in his career he has worked on over 100 game titles, some of his other credits include Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil, The Book of Eldritch Might series, the d20 Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying Game, The Book of Vile Darkness, Monte Cook’s Arcana Evolved, Ptolus, Monte Cook's World of Darkness, and Dungeonaday.com. He was a longtime author of the Dungeoncraft column in Dungeon Magazine. In recent years, Monte has been recognized many times by game fans in the ENnies Awards, the Pen & Paper fan awards, the Nigel D. Findley Memorial Award, the Origins Awards, and more. The author A graduate of the 1999 Clarion West writer's workshop, Monte has published two novels, The Glass Prison and Of Aged Angels. Also, he has published the short stories "Born in Secrets" (in the magazine Amazing Stories), "The Rose Window" (in the anthology Realms of Mystery), and "A Narrowed Gaze" (in the anthology Realms of the Arcane). His stories have appeared in the Malhavoc Press anthologies Children of the Rune and The Dragons' Return, and his comic book writing can be found in the Ptolus: City by the Spire series from DBPro/Marvel. His fantasy fiction series, "Saga of the Blade," appeared in Game Trade Magazine from 2005–2006. The geek In his spare time, Monte runs games, plays with his dog, watches DVDs, builds vast dioramas out of LEGO building bricks, paints miniatures, and reads a lot of comics.
